[INDOLOGY] "One Flew Over the Nest: an Externalist Among Pramāṇavādins", Serena Saccone, May 4 2021

[Charles DiSimone]

With all apologies for cross posting, this may be of interest to some
members of the list.

Dear Friends,

below please find information on the seventh lecture in the Ghent Center
for Buddhist Studies <http://www.cbs.ugent.be/node/1> Spring Lecture Series
(Permanent Training in Buddhist Studies (PTBS)) generously sponsored by the
Tianzhu Foundation. Serena Saccone, Associate Professor at the University
of Naples, “L’Orientale”, will give a lecture on May 04, 2021 at 19.00
Belgian time. All lectures in this series will be held remotely over Zoom.
Interested parties are welcome to attend the series or individual talks. To
get the Zoom link, please register by writing to CBS at ugent.be *by the
morning of May 04*. The link will be sent out the day of the talk.

With my kind regards,

Charles DiSimone

*One Flew Over the Nest: an Externalist Among Pramāṇavādins*

*Serena Saccone*
* University of Naples, “L’Orientale”*

Śubhagupta (8th cent.) is a key figure within the Buddhist tradition of
logic and epistemology (*pramāṇa*). Most of his works are in fact a
systematization, as well as elaboration, of the doctrines and arguments
found in Dharmakīrti’s writings. In this respect, he shares views
with (and perhaps also directly influenced) his fellow Buddhist
contemporaries, Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla, who represent the
mainstream tradition in the 8th century. On the other hand, as seen in his
magnum opus, the “Verses on the Demonstration of External Objects” (*
*Bāhyārthasiddhikārikā*), Śubhagupta significantly deviates from that
mainstream tradition on some crucial tenets by advocating the existence of
external objects and the illogicality that cognitions bear their objects’
images (*nirākāravāda*). The main point of contention appears to be (to
some extent) the theory of self-awareness (*svasaṃvedana*) of cognitions.
In this lecture, I shall present the pivotal elements of that internal
debate, which, arguably, made Śubhagupta the Buddhist externalist (
*bahirarthavādin*) *par excellence* for that tradition.

*Bio*

*Serena Saccone *is an Associate Professor at the University of Naples,
“L’Orientale.” She holds a PhD in Indology and Tibetology from the
University of Turin and was a research fellow at the Austrian Academy of
Sciences from 2015 to 2021. Her main area of research is the intellectual
history of Buddhism, focusing on South Asian authors from the early
medieval period, with a specific interest in epistemology, logic and
soteriology, as well as their interconnections. Saccone’s monograph, “On
the Nature of Things” (2018), concerns the internal Buddhist debate on
cognitions and their object in the 8th century. Her second book, “Tantra
and Pramāṇa. Studies in the Sāramañjarī” (2021), co-authored with
Péter-Dániel Szántó, deals with the interrelationship between Tantric
Buddhism and the Dignāga-Dharmakīrtian tradition of logic and
epistemology.
Dr. Charles DiSimone
Department of Languages and Cultures
Ghent University
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